“Anxious is the way I’d put it. I haven’t played in a little over five weeks. You can only do so many drills. Now it’s time to play.” DEREK JETER

TRENTON – Derek Jeter is back.

Well, almost back.

The celebrated Yankees’ shortstop made his first game appearance in uniform last night since suffering that devastating dislocated left shoulder injury while sliding head-first into third base on March 31.

He was scheduled to play five innings with the Yankees’ Double-A affiliate Trenton Thunder last night, his first action since the injury, and continue with the minor-league club through Sunday before rejoining the Yankees next week when they return from the West Coast trip.

“Anxious is the way I’d put it,” Jeter said before the game of his emotions. “I haven’t played in a little over five weeks. You can only do so many drills. Now it’s time to play. When you don’t play for that long, you miss it.”

Asked where he is in his rehab, Jeter said, “I’m probably ahead of [the team’s] schedule but behind my schedule. I don’t like sitting out, so it’s been long enough.”

A smirking Jeter, indicating a thaw to the supposed feud between he and George Steinbrenner that ensued in the offseason, joked that a soon-to-be-released Visa TV commercial promised to be “pretty funny.”

The spot is believed to focus on where to go for a night of partying in New York, spoofing Steinbrenner’s offseason rants about Jeter’s love for the New York nightlife.

The atmosphere for last night’s game in anticipation for Jeter’s return to the field was electric.

Though it was bobblehead night for “Boomer,” the mascot for the Trenton Thunder, that wasn’t why people were lined up around the team’s Waterfront Park stadium all day yesterday and tying up the team’s telephone switchboard for the last 48 hours.

Jeter, not “Boomer,” was the reason for what team owner Joe Finley called an “overwhelming buzz” surrounding the team and its stadium.

“This is big stuff in Central Jersey,” Finley beamed as Jeter took batting practice before the game. “We’re flattered. We’re humbled. We’re excited. It’s going to be a wonderful five days.”

Finley said the Thunder draw some 6,000 per game and he expected more than 8,000 last night with larger crowds over the weekend. He said the presence of Jeter eclipses the scene in 1998 when Trenton, then a Boston affiliate, hosted the Red Sox.

“This is the marquee player on the marquee sports franchise in the world coming to Trenton,” he said.

Indeed, Jeter looked like a man among boys, though he joked with the young players while taking BP and later said, “I’m just trying to stay out of the way.”

Jeter, who conceded that he’s been told to stay away from sliding or diving head-first for a while, said watching the Yankees play without him has been “weird” and “awkward.”

“When you get older you get a little bit wiser and learn that you have to have patience … even though I have none,” Jeter said. “I assume I’ll be rusty. It’s like spring training all over again.”

Jeter called being in the minors again “fun,” though he was quick to add, “but hopefully I’m not here for a long time.”